


This is a ghost story

by kalliel



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Headspace, POV Dean Winchester, water through pipes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-03
Updated: 2016-05-03
Packaged: 2018-06-06 04:29:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6738280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kalliel/pseuds/kalliel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All of the worst ghosts, of course, are familiar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is a ghost story

All of the worst ghosts, of course, are familiar. They’re the things you know well enough that they fade into the background--ticking clocks and water running through pipes. (Dean’s always been about the classics.)

The Bunker doesn’t have much in the way of ticking clocks, rift in time that it is, but Sam runs his shower and there’s that sound, of water through the pipes. It runs and runs--taking extra time to slide off all that hair and all that leg, Dean imagines. 

Dean imagines that the sound never stops.

It’s vestige more than presence. Illusion. Hallucination.

He’ll never tell Sam about this. Sam’s damn aware of the dark Dean’s mind can conjure when left to its own; this general tendency of Dean’s isn’t exactly a secret.

But this is different. 

Imagining Apocalypse--that’s resignation. Putting a ghost where there isn’t one? Now Dean’s talking active sabotage.

Maybe that’s why he starts fights--to fight sabotage with sabotage. Stupid things, mostly. Stupid like cake versus pie, katana versus rapier, possession versus salvation--versus saving your goddamn life. (Well, maybe that last one’s just him being stupid.) He starts stupid fights because complaisance kills. 

When you’ve accepted that your life is a nightmare--come to terms with it, decided you’re okay with that, you’re okay because the only way to survive this is to be okay--there’s room for little else. The ‘else’ gets wistful. And if there’s something that honestly grates on Dean, it’s wistfulness. Fuck that.

What Dean knows best are ghost stories.

Don’t get too close. Lie if you have to. Shout. _Hurt._

The bottom line is, if he and Sam get too comfortable with one another, one of them will turn to ghost. There’s an obvious threshold where things become too good to be true. Dean’s had some practical experience with this; he knows that you can wake from dreams, but never nightmares. Dreams, you can lose.

If you get too cozy, that’s it--you’re gone. Or your brother is. 

Dean’s afraid that one day he’ll wake up, and he’ll realize that the water never stopped.


End file.
